Per the depth chart: it's largely right in terms of who's the best in their given positions, but I don't think it is a guide for who's going to play with whom.

I think there's little chance we'll end up playing most of the season with Nash-Richards-Gaborik together. It looks dreamy on paper, but in today's NHL, you rarely get one superstar line -- teams are so good defensively, coaches like to balance out the scoring a bit so you force the other team to choose when to throw on their best defenders. As we all know, Torts doesn't go by 1st-line, 2nd-line, etc. anyway.

Edit: looking at it again, on defence, I still think Staal can come back as strong or even stronger than either Girardi or McDonagh, but only time will tell.

I say this all the time. I said it when the Nash trade was made. I don't think you should have all 3 on one line. It is stupid. Drop Gaborik to stepan's line, move callahan up to richards line. Even out the scoring. Callahan can win loose puck battles and get it to richards who can then setup nash. Stepan and Gaborik had chemistry on the GAS line last year with anisimov for a period of time. Insert Kreider.

Nash-Richards-Callahan
Kreider-Stepan-Gaborik

As far as the defense goes, it's a good problem to have deciphering who is your best defenseman out of 3 options.